Only Asleep, Little Angel
by Anna Lane
Summary: The Universe is strange and fate is cruel. Tom never got to meet Elena, despite the fact that they're destined to be together. What happens when they're finally pulled together, but too late? Tom Avery/Elena Gilbert AU


**A/N: This is just a small tribute to a character I really would've liked to have been fleshed out more.**

"Got three for you, tonight, Avery." The research assistant at the Richmond Police Department unceremoniously pushed a body cart into his small morgue. The two EMT's behind her rolled in two more.

He raised his eyebrows. "Autopsies on all of them?"

She shook her head as she snapped her gum. "It's just a family that died driving off a bridge. Drowning. But the Mystic Falls coroner requested you take a look at the girl because they don't have the resources."

Avery sighed. "If they know it was a drowning, why do they need me to cut into her?"

She shrugged. "Guess cause she was so young? I don't know. If you ask me, that whole town gives me the creeps."

She left, leaving Avery with the bodies.

Tom Avery pulled the white sheet from the first cart. He'd never seen such a beautiful girl. He tugged the sheet off almost nervously, and let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding when it was done and she was bare before him.

He could never remember feeling remorse in his time as a medical examiner. Sure, he'd seen young, old, ugly, pretty, but the truth was, it was hard for him to mourn when they were so clearly gone. Even if they came back, they wouldn't have much of a home anymore. But this girl, she looked like she was just sleeping.

He watched her chest, sure he'd see it rise. He'd be one of those medical examiners to find a miracle body, one only mistakenly declared dead. But he didn't see anything except still flesh. He touched her cheek and she was cold.

He covered her with the sheet once more while he went to the other bodies. He did a quick check of the girl's—he looked at her chart to see her name was Elena Gilbert—of Elena's parents, x-raying and probing until confirming that their deaths were in accordance with drowning.

When he went to the girl, he frowned. She didn't look like she took after either of her parents. He took a scalpel to her chest and lingered there a moment before finally exerting just the right amount of pressure to cut through skin, but not organ or muscle.

Tom had never taken so much time on an autopsy before. It was absurd, but he almost wanted it to last. He knew he'd never see her again. And even if he could, somehow, she wouldn't be in the condition she was in now.

She was—exquisite. There was no other word for it. He carefully detached muscle from organ, organ from body. He cradled them anxiously as he placed them aside for individual assessment. After a thorough examination of her lungs, he saw that they were, indeed, full of water. In those precious few minutes it likely took for Elena to lose her life, he knew her kidney would have experienced acute failure. There would be signs of cardiac arrest if her heart had slowed from the cold. He checked, and both affirmed the death by drowning.

Each organ was placed back in her body. Sometimes it was difficult, getting them all to fit into a body after it's been torn apart, but Tom had taken special care with Elena Gilbert. He remembered precisely where and at what angle every piece of her had been. He put her insides back inside her and stared for a moment. She was like a completed puzzle.

He set to sewing up her skin to hide the part of a body no one ever wants to see. He used his best, neatest stiches to match her flesh up perfectly, almost lovingly. He wiped her clean of any excess liquid that spilled onto her skin. It wasn't his job, the people at the funeral home usually do that, but he couldn't help himself. She'd been perfect when she came in, and he wanted to preserve that as much as possible.

Tom looked back at her face. She still _looked_ absolutely perfect. Maybe a little pale, but definitely as if at any time the muscles in her cheek would contract and her face would melt into a beautiful smile.

Without thinking, he ran an ungloved hand through her shiny chocolate-brown hair. He stopped immediately and stared at his hand as if it were possessed. He looked back at the girl and gulped. Touching her hair had stirred up the scent of her shampoo, still there even through her drowning. The scent drifted into his nose and he breathed deeply.

He leaned down to inhale even more of the scent. Like strawberries or kiwi or something sweet, fresh. Something alive. His eyes had been closed as he concentrated on the scent, but then they opened to find he was hovering just above her face. His mouth was lined perfectly with hers.

Without thinking, he found himself leaning down even further. His lips touched her cold ones for an instant before he pulled up. He thought about the chart at the end of her table. She was 120lbs, 5'6." She just lost her parents. She was 17. She was dead. He wiped off the faint trace that might be there after the slight kiss, disgusted with himself.

He really was in the wrong profession. All he'd ever wanted to be was a doctor, and he thought an EMT would be a perfect career pathway. But now he was here, in a morgue. He cut people up instead of saving them.

The wheels squeaked as he rolled Elena's parents from their slabs into the cold chamber. Since they were vacated at different times, there were no two spots next to each other, and any formal organization was virtually impossible. He didn't know why, but he found it incredibly sad Elena and her parents would be separated in death, even if it was only for the short time they would remain at his morgue.

He went back to her and looked at her face for a few moments. There was some sort of familiarity there. Perhaps he had spent too much time with the body. He tugged the sheet to cover her entire body, but stopped at her face. "I would have given anything to save you," he told her, before pulling the sheet over her completely and seeing her body for the last time.


End file.
